WASHINGTON — The $230 million temporary pier that the U.S. military built on short notice to rush humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip has largely failed in its mission, aid organizations say, and will probably end operations weeks earlier than originally expected.

In the month since it was attached to the shoreline, the pier has been in service only about 10 days. The rest of the time, it was being repaired after rough seas broke it apart, detached to avoid further damage or paused because of security concerns.

The pier was never meant to be more than a stopgap measure while the Biden administration pushed Israel to allow more food and other supplies into Gaza through land routes, a far more efficient way to deliver relief. But even the modest goals for the pier are likely to fall short, some U.S. military officials say.

When the pier was conceived, health authorities were warning that the territory was on the precipice of famine. In recent weeks, Israel has given relief organizations greater access, but the groups say the situation remains dire.

The Biden administration initially predicted that it would be September before surging seas would make the pier inoperable. But military officials are now warning aid organizations that the project could be dismantled as early as next month, a looming deadline that officials say they hope will pressure Israel to open more ground routes.

President Joe Biden ordered the pier built in March, at a time when he was being sharply criticized for not doing more to rein in Israel’s military response to the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attacks.

The first truckloads of aid began moving ashore May 17. Since then, the project has struggled as many Gaza residents endure immense hunger, aid groups say.

In the latest blow to the aid effort, the U.S. military said on Friday that it would temporarily move the pier to keep it from being damaged by high seas.

The decision “is not made lightly but is necessary to ensure the temporary pier can continue to deliver aid in the future,” the U.S. Central Command said in a post on social media, stating that the pier would be towed to Israel. Sabrina Singh, a Pentagon spokesperson, said on Monday the pier could be reattached and aid deliveries resumed later this week.

Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday claimed the United States is withholding weapons and implied this was slowing Israel’s offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, where fighting has exacerbated the already dire humanitarian situation for Palestinians.

Biden has delayed delivering certain heavy bombs since May over concerns about Israel’s killing of civilians in Gaza. Yet the administration has gone to lengths to avoid any suggestion that Israeli forces have crossed a red line in the deepening Rafah invasion, which would trigger a more sweeping ban on arms transfers.

Netanyahu, in a short video, spoke directly to the camera in English as he lobbed sharp criticisms at Biden over “bottlenecks” in arms transfers.

“It’s inconceivable that in the past few months, the administration has been withholding weapons and ammunitions to Israel,” Netanyahu said, adding, “Give us the tools and we’ll finish the job a lot faster.”

Netanyahu also claimed U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, in a recent visit to Israel, said he was working around the clock to end the delays.

However, Blinken said Tuesday the only pause was related to those heavy bombs from May.

“We, as you know, are continuing to review one shipment that President Biden has talked about with regard to 2,000-pound bombs because of our concerns about their use in a densely populated area like Rafah,” Blinken said during a State Department news conference. “That remains under review. But everything else is moving as it normally would.”

Netanyahu didn’t elaborate on what weapons were being held back, and the Israeli military declined to respond to a request for comment.

Responding to Netanyahu’s claim Tuesday, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said, “We generally do not know what he’s talking about. We just don’t.”

Two top Democrats in Congress — New York Rep. Gregory Meeks, the ranking member on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and Maryland Sen. Benjamin Cardin, chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee — cleared the way this week for a $15 billion U.S. sale of F-15s to Israel to move forward, after a delay while Meeks sought answers from the Biden administration on Israel’s current use of U.S. weapons in the war in Gaza.

Associated Press contributed.